


fearful symmetry

by myholyground



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst and Feels, Character Study, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Minor Violence, Reylo - Freeform, That's probably not how the Force works, What-If, darkness vs light, force bond moments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-12
Updated: 2018-02-12
Packaged: 2019-03-17 12:52:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13659375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myholyground/pseuds/myholyground
Summary: She senses the ghost of his hands floating around her in an attempt to hold her, and she feels that giving in to that touch would be like giving in to her darkest desires, to her forbidden whims.-------------------a series of force bond moments set after TLJ, exploring the character development of Ben and Rey and the way they affect each other





	fearful symmetry

**Author's Note:**

> the title and all the quotes are from William Blake

_without contraries is no progression._

_attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence._

 

* * *

 

 

_little lamb, who made thee?_

_dost thou know who made thee?_

 

  Silence is a constant buzz which sets the world on fire and everything around him, until he is blind and deaf. He has never felt such a void so charged and thick and present. Weird how that silence reminds him of everything that’s absent in his life. All he has ever known has always been volatile and uncertain; nothing’s ever stayed. And now the only thing that’s been with him since he can remember ‒ that unchanging voice in his head which knew his desires, feasted on his weaknesses, which had promised him a semblance of peace ‒ is gone, _at his hand_. Everything is gone at his hand. No, non just _his hand_. Another hand is guilty, the hand that could’ve ended all of this, the war, his lust for power, the cries in his head; if only she had taken the hand he was offering.

  That would have changed everything.

 

~~\--------------------~~

_the crow wished everything was black,_

_the owl, that everything was white._

 

  The first time she feels his presence again, she decides to ignore him. It’s a physical struggle to keep herself from turning and pretending not to feel his breath on the back of her head when he gets closer ‒ _too close_. He doesn’t speak, seems to understand he will not get any answer, and she almost feels relieved. Though there’s no need for words between them: thus, she starts shivering when she’s hit by the darkest despair, by a cold rage, by a disconcerting bewilderment. They’re drifting in the abysmal sky and everything is blurred and heavy and tangible and not tangible enough, like when you can’t breathe and blood doesn’t flow to your brain and your chest feels like too-narrow cage, and everything is _too much too much too much_. And that everything becomes a colorless nothing.

 

  Once again, she shuts him out. She slams the door in his face as one does with unpleasant thoughts. Maybe it’s too soon, maybe she needs time too heal undetectable wounds. He basks in this idea, spends his nights imagining what would it be like if one day she decided to join him and save him. Like everyone, he wishes to be saved as well; perhaps not in the way she wants ‒ because she pictures a future that’s too bright and delicate, so soft that’s inconsistent ‒, but salvation is what it is. He dreams of his demons not clinging to his doubts anymore, he dreams of his flaws to become his strength. He dreams of a life where she is not his weakness.

  But maybe it’s too late, and she has already taken sides and is ready to destroy everything he stands for. And maybe he is past saving.

 

 

~~\--------------------~~

_I will not cease from mental fight._

_nor shall my sword sleep in my hand._

 

  Hearing her voice again is a slap in the face, is like waking up from a nightmare and realizing you’re alone. For days, maybe months, he has watched her without making a sound, forced to see how _goddamn_ good she is at ignoring him, while his hands quiver whenever he feels her so close he could touch her.

  «Ben.»

  The sound of that name slipping on her tongue and popping up her lips is an arm that drags him off the edge. And he feels it again, the _Light_.

 

  He’s calm when he speaks to her. He’s always calm when he speaks to her. She’s seen scream and fight like the lowest of the beasts, she’s felt his rage and his ruthlessness: and yet, in these moments where it’s just the tow of them, he is quiet and meek. The storm is constantly raging in his head, but in these moments he seems to be able to restrain it. And this confuses her more than anything else. Because the hope brought to her by that seeming self-control is hollow and tenuous, and she knows it.

  «So now I’m worthy of your attention.»

  With a glance, she begs him not to talk about it. He indulges her.

  «Where are you?»

  «Don’t ask.» she begs again.

  He nods, and keeps his gaze on a floor she can’t see.

  «You’re with them.»

  She doesn’t understand how could he think otherwise. She thought she had set the record straight, she thought it was clear, at this point, that if they were to be on the same side on the battlefield it would have been because _he_ had made the right choice.

  «Rey.»

  Hearing him say her name is another thing that confuses her. She’s never thought about the power that names hold, not until he had whispered hers and not until she had decided to call him Ben instead of Kylo Ren.

  «I wish I could tell you everything.» Rey confesses in a burst of honesty. She always feel so vulnerable when she’s with him, in those moments when the outside world stops and leaves room for them, and allows two souls, lonesome and parted by a whole universe, to find each other and be a little less lonesome. «I wish I could tell you where I am, and I wish I could tell you what’s happening here. I wish you would join me and see for yourself.»

 

  The implications of what she’s saying are not lost on him. She’s asking him to change, to repent, to accept that side of him that took him years to wreck.

  Whenever they’re together, something is reborn in Ben: he feels his skin healing and his muscles reinvigorating. His soul, however, is more torn apart than ever. He senses the weight of time on his mind and on his shoulders, the touch of a thousand hands pulling him in a thousand different directions, the yearning to be what is not and the shame of being what he is, and the need to beg for forgiveness for what he’s done but most of all for what he’s _not_ done.

  «I can’t.» he tells her, and thus collapses the last bulwark of his belief.

 

~~\--------------------~~

 

_o rose thou art sick._

_the invisible worm,_

_that flies in the night_

_in the howling storm:_

_has found out thy bed_

_of crimson joy:_

_and his dark secret love_

_does thy life destroy_

 

  General Organa dies on a starless night, and Ben does not need to be informed, because he _felt it_. It’s disorienting: he thought he knew pain, thought he was used to it, thought he had made it his; above all, he thought he could never feel it in a time like this. But then again, the lack of family has always been the root cause of his pain; and now the last person who shared his blood is gone.

  He deceives himself into thinking he can endure it, telling himself that it’s not importante, that she’s neve really been his _mother_ , that this doesn’t change anything, it actually makes it easier.

  He deceives himself into thinking he’s strong, because he’s lived his whole life without his family and he can continue to do so, because this doesn’t change anything, it actually makes it easier. 

  He deceives himself into thinking he’s at peace, and he should be, with the Resistance suddenly deprived of its leader and with its unsettled Rebels, for this doesn’t change anything, it actually makes it easier.

  He deceives himself again and again and again ‒ ‘till he speaks with Rey. Because Leia Organa’s death changes everything.

 

  Rey thinks she can manage not to cry. She’s sure she exorcised all her pain, she thinks she doesn’t need to mourn, and she’s confident the funeral wont’ affect her.

  Instead, she cries before she sees her: the general, asleep in a glass casket like a princess. She weeps for for Leia, for the Rebels, for Chewie, for Han, for Poe and Finn, for Luke, for his parents; for the family she thought she had found and that has been taken away from her ‒ _once again once again_. She weeps for herself and for Ben.

  «You should have been there.» she tells him when he appears to her, shortly after the funeral. She does not look at him, for she almost fears that he could read her expression and parce it incorrectly. There’s hopelessness on her face, not because of her loss, but because of the outrage she feels towards him.

  «You had the right to be there.»

  He winces at her words. Perhaps it’s a notion he understand, that of blood ties; perhaps, by cutting the tether that bound him to his family he forgot what it is to love _in spite of_ , and to forgive _although_ , and perhaps if he had been someone different he would have been there. Perhaps he genuinely felt he had no right to be there. Perhaps she should stop trying to save him.

  «Why weren’t you there?» Her voice sounds as small as she looks, as watered down and lost and hurt as she is.

  He draws closer, slowly, quietly, as if he doesn’t want to scare her; but when he takes the first step she turns her back to him to face a wall that exists also in his part of the universe. He’d like to hold her and soothe her: she feels it clearly and he doesn’t try to hide it. In Rey’s mind, though, in her heart, in her being, there’s an ongoing battle: because she wants want he wants, but doesn’t want him to know. At any cost, he mustn’t know

  She senses the ghost of his hands floating around her in an attempt to hold her, and she feels that giving in to that touch would be like giving in to her darkest desires, to her forbidden whims: so she turns to face him, pleased to see him flinch.

  «She is your mother, Ben.»

  He does not look at her, as if he’s not brave enough, as if she’s saying exactly what he has been telling himself for day to torture his own mind; she eyes him carefully: looks at the scar she gave him, a display of his inner fight, that fight which tears him apart as she tore his flesh, and looks at his face, that face that hunts not only her nightmares, but her dreams too.

  «It broke her heart non seeing you before her death.» she tells him. «You broke her heart, Ben.»

  Those are harsh words, but he needs to hear them, e Rey utters them in an almost accusatory tone, and Ben fails to see what is different about her. Because something has changed. Because Leia Organa’s death changes everything.

 

~~\--------------------~~

 

_when the stars threw down their spears,_

_and water'd heaven with their tears:_

_did he smile his work to see?_

_did he who made the lamb make thee?_

_tyger! tyger! burning bright_

_in the forests of the night:_

_what immortal hand or eye_

_dare frame thy fearful symmetry?_

 

  Pain is a scorching hand which leaves mark wherever it lays its fingers, it’s an unspoken word o barely whispered, it’s the need of screaming and the shame of letting go, it’s like losing over and over again. It’s watching as the world finds a way to move on, sensing that time flows like breeze through your fingers, learning that not everything can be brought back. It’s wanting to open your mouth again and being able to say _in spite of_ ( _in spite of everything, we’re here; in spite of everything, we carry on_ ).

  Pain is alienating.

  Rey’s been alone for so long that slipping back into solitude is almost inescapable. At some point, it becomes soothing: there in her isolation she owes nothing to nobody; she doesn’t have to pretend that she’s fine, that she’s ready to fight, to go over strategies and to rehearse plans of action ‘till she feel nauseous. In her loneliness there’s only she her pain. Rey’s fine with that. She likes pain.

  There is something inside her that’s screaming, asking to come out, she wants so _so bad_ to let everything out, to free and be freed; yell until she’s hoarse, shatter everything that’s before her, release all the air out of her lungs, and feel, at long last, empty.

 

~~\--------------------~~

 

_in what distant deeps or skies_

_burnt the fire of thine eyes?_

 

  Ben feels a tearing rage when he discovers that Rey was put in solitary confinement.

  «They found out.» she tells him. «About this… _thing_ … we have. And they’re worried it might give aways their position.»

  And the way she speaks of _them_ and not of _us_ is not lost on Ben.

  «But you told them, right? You told them you would never do that.»

  He realizes he sounds like kid who’s still living on empty promises, who still thinks that there is good in the world and only a few things are corruptible. And he doesn’t know why he feels the need to be reassured by her, to hear her say that _of course_ she would never reveal her position to the enemy. But she doesn’t.

 

  Rey senses something in Ben, something both unknown and familiar at the same time, like hearing your own echo or seeing yourself in the mirror after a long time. He’s still calling her to him, but his _intention_ is different: it seems like he wants to help her. Rey knows that seeing her in a cell upset him, despite him being the first to imprison her. She also senses indignation: Ben feels betrayed on her behalf. And Rey wonders why he’s feeling all of this so deeply while she just feels… numb.

  «Tell me what I can do.»

  Rey shakes her head. What can he do? Nothing. What would he _want_ to do? Free her? Only to then imprison her on his own terms?

  _Don’t let him win_ , the voice in her head whispers again. She’s been hearing those words a lot in the past days, and she doesn’t really know who they refer to, but each time they bring her back on her path allowing her to regain her sanity.

  «There’s nothing you can do.» she answers. «But maybe I can do something.»

  Ben is unsettled, she can see it, and something inside of her rejoices at his reaction to her following words.

  «I can tell you where the Resistance is stationed.»

 

~~\--------------------~~

 

_every night and every morn_

_some to misery are born._

_every morn and every night_

_some are born to sweet delight,_

_some are born to endless night._

 

  Rey is starting to second-guess her plan, for ben looks more and more conflicted.

  «Why haven’t you attacked the Resistance yet?» she asks him.

  Perhaps it is not him; but it _has_ to be him.

  «A lot has changed. And I… Everything has changed.» he answers.

  He is the only one who can understand her, the only one who can guide her. He saw it. And now they seem so different from each other. Incompatible.

  _You don’t need anybody_ , the voice says.

 

  Ben feels the the weight of the informations Rey gave him at every step he takes, at every order he gives, at every strategy he chooses and at every decision that brings him closer to the Rebels. The truth is, he doesn’t know what else to do with those co-ordinates other than avoiding them. He doesn’t know exactly when he started doing so, but soon he realizes that he’s dancing around that series of numbers that could decide the fate of the fight. It wouldn’t take much: the Resistance weakened by the death of the general, a surprise attack, no prisoners. Perhaps, one prisoner ‒ except she has decided not to get caught.

  «You’re not with them anymore.»

  It’s supposed to be a question, but his tone is wrong, and Ben really doesn’t want it to sound like an accusation ‒ because why would he _accuse_ her of something like that?

  Rey’s back is turned on him, she doesn’t show she heard him.

  «Where are you?» but he doesn’t really need to ask. «You’re on the island.» he answers himself, and the moment he speaks those words, he senses something, something that crawls and slithers and infects and stains.

  «I didn’t know where else to go.» she admits. Ben feels again that sense of familiarity, of sympathy: Rey is alone, alone like he’s been; that loneliness which devours your insides, feasts upon your soul and leaves your mind to rot. That loneliness which pushes you into doing something desperate, because it lacks hope.

  «Did you run away?»

  Rey doesn’t turn, so he chooses to go around her. When he faces her, instead of her eyes he sees two dark pits full of misery and abandon. He smells something rotting. And all of a sudden he realizes tangibly what he has only been suspecting all that time, still hoping that is wasn’t true, that it was all in his flawed head: Rey has been corrupted.

  «You killed someone.»

  When she raises her stare, Ben holds his breath: there is nothing, on Rey’s face, that shows any sing of distraught; she’s completely expressionless.

  «I had no choice. They wouldn’t let me go.» She says it in the same she had accused him of breaking his mother’s heart: ambiguous, devious, surprisingly flat.

  Rey’s expression mirrors an inkling of peace, though not peace as in serenity. It’s the depiction of absence, of a mind who’s decided to free itself by entrusting control to _something else_. It’s a type of peace that ben has never felt ‒ he never could.

 

  She upset him, it’s clear.

  «Ben.» Rey is still using that name, although it is slowly losing its meaning.

  He watches her, has watched her the whole time; his name on her lips still makes him wince, and she gets and adrenaline rush from that power she has over him.

  _It takes so little._

  She reaches out her hand, like he did long ago, when he had promised her the universe and more.

  «Tell me you’re with me. Tell me you’re on my side.»

  He drags his eyes towards that outstretched hand, a temptation and a bond of corruption. He falters.

  «The thing is… I don’t quite know what is your side, Rey.»

  «It’s us, Ben. Me and you. And the whole galaxy.»

  Redundant words, that once had an equal and opposite meaning. And Rey utters them with a spine-chilling thoughtlessness.

  But the man in front of her, the one who had once promised her what he is about to deny now, is conflicted; he’s always been and always will be. There are no light sides and dark sides in Ben Solo:  he’s a combination of grey scales, a crowding of doubts and resolutions, a soul fighting with it’s troubled spirit.

  He is someone Rey does not need.

 

~~\--------------------~~

 

_we are not meant to resolve all contradictions_

_but to live with them and rise above them._

 

  When they meet again physically, they’re on opposite ends of the battlefield. They’ve always been, but now the roles are reversed. Now everything is different yet so painfully familiar: the snow covering a ground as barren as their connection; the buzz of lightsabers crashing into each other, the way they always do; faltering steps chasing after one another in a brutal dance, a wild and labile hunt.

  And as the fight is bursting somewhere all around them, Ben and Rey can only feel _their own_ noises: snow dislodged by their steps, silence filled with their labored breaths; and they dare not speak.

  Rey is uncontrollable, driven by a dark power, a terrifying determination in her eyes.

 And she is beautiful. Ben feels a hole in his chest, as if his heart is not supported anymore, left afloat in his body. He’s scared, more than anything, because he realizes that this is what he thought he wanted for so long: that shadow in Rey’s eyes, her mind finally akin to his, their fates together as one. He’s scared, truly, because he realizes he’s never wanted this, never wanted to see her broken , poisoned by pain, tainted by the inevitability of sorrow. And he doesn’t want to fight her, doesn’t want to destroy her. He can’t stand to lose her.

  «Rey, please!»

  Another swing of the lightsaber, another blow he diverts without attacking.

  «I want to help you. You need to trust me.» he begs her.

  The irony of the situation is almost cruel, for not long ago he had offered her perdition with the same words of salvation.

  «Supreme Leader Kylo Ren.» she yells scornful, kicking him in the chest. «Pathetic.»

  «I left the First Order. I am not who I was.»

  «You didn’t have the nerve to pursue your task. But I am not that weak.»

  Those words remind him of years of sacrifice and pain and _it is never enough_ and _I will do better, I swear._

  «Darkness is a weakness, Rey. Crushing sorrow by undoing yourself is weakness.»

  She screams, doesn’t want to listen, she only wants to fight, destroy, tear and knock down. There’s no room for anything else in her mind.

  «I know what you’re feeling.» he yells. «I know what it means to lose everything.»

  «You know nothing about me!» The despair he hears in her voice makes him sink in an abyss of guilt and self-loathing.

  «Don’t do this to yourself, Rey. You don’t deserve it.»

  She falters when she sees him get closer with his weapon down.

  «I know the rage you’re feeling. I know what you think you want, and I know you don’t really want it. Darkness can promise you many things, but not peace.»

  Anger and determination on Rey’s face and turn into a painful confusion.

  «I can teach you how to leave with your darkest part. I can teach you how to process sorrow, how to draw strength from pain without undoing yourself.»

 

  Leia’s death took her hope; isolation took her faith; pain took her away from love.

  The truth is, it has been so _easy_ to let Darkness win, to let it hold her with its claws e fead her with devious promises. And Kylo Ren… No, _Ben_. He’s the one standing in front of her, offering her everything she thought she had lost.

  Ben’s lightsaber rises to ward off Rey’s umpteenth blow. She looks into his eyes and sees complete honesty ‒ for the first time after so long. She can almost see his heart, throbbing with life and _light_.

  «Ben… It hurts so much.»

  She watches his face, memorizes it, for the last time. The she closes her eyes and deactivates her lightsaber.

 

  Ben’s cry is of pure despair when he realizes that it’s too late, that is lightsaber is destined to stake Rey’s body ‒ no, it’s not a matter of destiny: she chose this.

  This is what she thought him: we all make are own choices; we save ourselves. Except, ben and Rey have never been two different people.

  Therefore Ben deactivates his lightsaber, but it still manages to hurt Rey. The burning makes her scream and when she opens her eyes they drown in his. She looks at him like he’s everything, like he’s the last person in the entire galaxy, like she’s finally found her missing half. They fall to their knees and Rey holds him, and Ben thinks that if he is to die here and now this would still be the best moment of his life.

  And suddenly the world is balanced, and light and darkness are just names given to vague concepts that no longer affect human experience.

  Ben holds Rey like she’s his last hope, and when they part just enough to allow him to look at her, she smiles, her face adorned with a scar opposite and equal to his.

 

 

* * *

 

 

_to see a world in a grain of sand,_

_and a heaven in a wild flower,_

_hold infinity in the palm of your hand,_

_and eternity in an hour_

**Author's Note:**

> this is more of a character study than a plot-driven story, but i hope you liked it. english is not my first language, so i apologize for any mistake, and if you want to point them out in the comments i'll be glad to correct them :)  
> also, i have a little spotify playlist for the story if you're interested: https://open.spotify.com/user/nt4dlzezv8uo2khes8wbhav5s/playlist/6s79LIufU8M6wlcBD9F23f


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